Post by kerouac2 on Nov 1, 2012 18:54:01 GMT

I might find myself making more reports about the outlying suburbs of Paris in the coming months due to the changes in the travel passes. Those of us with monthly or yearly passes are now allowed to go anywhere in the 5 travel zones of the Paris metropolitan area on weekends and holidays. I have been a bit timid about using this function since it started, because I am always afraid that my pass will suddenly buzz red instead of beeping green when I wave it over the sensors on the train turnstiles or on the bus, but no, it seems to work just fine.

So today I decided to make a visit to Saint Germain-en-Laye, where I used to go regularly, but I have not been there for years. One interesting thing to know about the Paris to Saint Germain train line is that it was the very first passenger train line ever built in France. It has been in operation since 1837, which is pretty impressive. Now it is just part of the RER A suburban network, but it is still a trip in time.

All Saints Day being a holiday and my reason for riding the rails "free," the train was not all that crowded.

If you have any knowledge of sociology, you will know that this is a line through quite wealthy areas. Nothing as special as a train would have ever been built for poor folks back in those days. In 2012, it is not the very richest area, but most of the people living along the line are not hurting for money.

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 1, 2012 20:01:23 GMT

As I emerged from the RER, it was exactly 10 a.m. and I witnessed a strange phenomenon rarely seen in Paris. Saint Germain is near Versailles and shares many of its traits -- wealthy, conservative, royalist and... Catholic.

People were streaming into the church with blank looks on their faces, like eloi who had heard the siren of the morlocks.

Naturally, I followed them to see if they would be devoured by the morlocks.

Bells started tinkling to call them to submission, so I quickly ducked out.

I had never been inside the château, so I decided to take a look at it. It is the national museum of prehistoric artifacts and some other stuff, not sure what...

There was no charge to enter the first part of the building, so I looked at the displays.

weapons of mass destruction!

sculpture from more than 2000 years ago

There were lovely bronze age tools and carved bones on display.

And there are always flints when you dig farther into the past.

But I decided not to go into the main part of the museum today. Maybe next time.

I took a look at the inner courtyard.

The moat also had some mysterious artifacts.

I glanced back at the church and struck out across the huge esplanade of the château.

Post by htmb on Nov 2, 2012 2:58:50 GMT

I love the diagrams inside the Paris metros and trains the showing stops. In Washington, DC the conductors make an announcement at each stop instead, and I can't always hear/understand that they are saying.

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 2, 2012 5:51:23 GMT

The winter season of the park just began on November 1st, so all of the various things that were open the day before are now closed until next spring.

However, most people come to Saint Germain for one thing and one things only -- not the château, not the church, not the lovely and historical old town, not the birthplace of Louis XIV, but very simply for the terrace.

It was built between 1668 and 1675 by Le Nôtre to serve the two châteaux of Saint Germain-en-Laye. Two castles? The one we just saw is the Château-Vieux of François I and was first built in 1124. It was burned down except for the chapel in 1346 and the château was rebuilt in 1366. It was the royal residence of various kings of France until 1682 when Louis XIV moved to Versailles.

The château-neuf in the meantime had been built practically next door by Henri II and Catherine de Médicis in 1566. After Henri II died in a tournament, Catherine didn't want to go there anymore, because an astrologer had informed her that she would die there. However, Henri IV liked the place and moved there; he had it enlarged in 1594.

In 1777, the château-neuf was pretty run down, so it was decided that it should be torn down and rebuilt. But, oops!, there was the revolution in 1789. The building was seized by the government and then sold to its former manager. He tore it down and built houses on the grounds, using the stones from the château. All that is left is the Pavilion Henri IV, birthplace of Louis XIV.

At the moment, we are still headed for the terrace.

Here is the Pavilion Henri IV.

The terrace is 2400 meters long, but it seems longer when you walk the entire length.

It overlooks the valley of the Seine, so the view from there is remarkable. See the Eiffel Tower behind the hill?

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 2, 2012 12:46:34 GMT

Along the terrace, there are a number of gates that lead into the forest of Saint Germain-en-Laye. Some of the forest lanes are full sized boulevards and others are just little tracks. This is one of the big ones.

The carpet of leaves was really quite thick.

The underbrush always fascinates me.

There was also a little trail following the forest wall.

Back on the terrace, I could see a few little agricultural parcels. These are becoming quite rare this close to Paris, but they are totally protected by the government -- they are zoned definitively as agricultural land and cannot be rezoned for any other use unless the government needs to expropriate the land for an important project. (This comes to mind because over the next 20 years, they will be building a peripheral super metro circling Paris from about this distance, and clearly it will be much easier to lay rails on land like this than tear down suburban houses.)

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 2, 2012 14:01:26 GMT

All of this part of the western suburbs is a hive of underground quarries hundreds of years old. Even though it wasn't specifically stated that quarry danger was the reason for closing off some of the terrace, that would be my first guess regarding some of these fences off areas. What I thought was even more interesting is how fast nature claims back the pathways when no one is walking on them.

These cows were placed here keep the grass in check in the field below the terrace.

The end of the terrace was finally in sight.

I looked back and couldn't even see my starting point at the Pavilion Henri IV.

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 2, 2012 18:09:22 GMT

Just before I ducked into the forest, I noticed another small château a few hundred meters away. I had no idea what it was, but Google is my friend. It is the Château du Val, just one of the many hunting lodges that Henri IV built in the forest. It was abandoned when the royal court moved from Saint Germain to Versailles but a minor prince bought it about a hundred years later and fixed it up again. Benjamin Franklin was among the guests there, along with Mozart and Voltaire -- not all at the same time, of course.

The place changed hands from time to time up to the 20th century. Almost all of the grounds were sold off for housing developments and the château itself apparently served as an old age home in the 1930's for people who had been awarded the Légion d'Honneur. It appeared to be in "mixed" use now -- for rich old people (60 rooms), but also with the big reception rooms available for private functions.

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 3, 2012 10:31:41 GMT

Damn the impending storm, I wanted to see a few more things in the formal gardens. Drops were beginning to fall, however, and I could tell that my cheap Chinese umbrella would not be sufficient, especially since the wind was gusting.

The gardens should be seen in the summer of course, not now with no flowers.

It's kind of cool to stand somewhere where people had duels.

I don't know what this is and I was in too much of a hurry to find out.

Post by htmb on Nov 3, 2012 14:27:24 GMT

Kerouac, I've enjoyed reading this trip report very much as it's just the type of thing I enjoy doing. I love to just wander and explore an area. The beautiful fall color made your wonderful photos even more delightful. Too bad about the storm. Those were some very dark clouds indeed!

Post by tod2 on Nov 3, 2012 15:41:49 GMT

I loved reading this and the photos are wonderful. The autumn shades are something I have yet to experience in Paris. The brewing storm reminded me of the day we visited the cathedral St.Denis and the heavens opened during lunch.

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 3, 2012 16:24:18 GMT

I had orginally been planning to do a report of both the château grounds and the old town, but the weather put sort of, er, a damper on my plans. Here are just a few photos of the pedestrian streets behind the church to give you an idea of the town, though.

It should be mentioned that there is a sort of mall complex in the old town when the weather is really bad.

Time to go home and dry out so I headed back to the RER.

If you have a bike, you can easily transport it from Paris.

The RER crosses the Seine 4 times on the way back to Paris.(and cameras will always focus on the window instead of what is beyond!)

* * * * *

One thing that not everybody knows is that a huge number of Americans lived in Saint Germain-en-Laye from 1952 until 1966 when the U.S. military bases were invited to leave France. The base in Saint Germain was the headquarters of the American army in France -- the vestiges are still in the middle of the forest of Saint Germain. It had a school for 400 children, a bowling alley, a cinema, football and baseball fields and its own private military bus line to Paris. I have met a number of people who grew up there and they absolutely loved the place.

Post by kerouac2 on Nov 3, 2012 20:23:45 GMT

It is now a French military installation. That's what usually happens when one country takes over such a thing from another country. I would be curious to know if France paid compensation to the United States for this, but I didn't find the information. Probably not, though, because it was already a French base before it was offered to the United States.

Post by mossie on Nov 4, 2012 8:30:08 GMT

A wonderful report as usual, I have no need now to drag my tired old legs out there as I had intended ;DThe unusual growth of that tree could be the result of "coppicing", see this site, www.coppice.co.uk